Yesterday my holy paladin was in a PUG with "that guy", you know, the type who inspects your gear and enjoys pointing out even minor deviations from the perceived optimum, even if they have zero impact on the success of the group in that particular heroic. In my case his only complaint was that I had enchanted my boots with a +spirit enchant, instead of a +stamina enchant. I would have ignored that, but then I followed a link from MMO-Champion to a new application Elitist Armory, which promptly proceeded to tell me that my holy paladin was fine except for that +spirit enchant on his boots.

Now I'm used to playing a priest as healer. My paladin already has better stamina and better armor than my better geared priest. And as I'm only doing heroics, as a healer I shouldn't really get hit all that often. So I considered a +stamina enchant to be downright useless for me. Now I'm well aware that the effect of spirit on a paladin healer is much, much smaller than on a priest. But at least there is a tiny, positive effect on mana regeneration.

So why does everybody think that stamina would be a better enchant for my boots than spirit? Is the case so clear cut that stamina is the only viable alternative? Or is there at least a degree of choice, in which I just happened to choose the less conventional one?
- posted by Tobold Stoutfoot @ 2:55 PM Permanent Link
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I think it doesn't really matter, and the dude should mind his own business.

The +sta enchant is arguably more useful though. The gain from +spi is so tiny compared to similarly small boost that the +sta would give you. In early instances though, with new tanks, DPS queuing as tanks, and DPS not understanding aggro, a little bit of extra survivability can make the difference between a close call and a 5 minute res run/re-buff/wait for the hunter to walk his dog.

Stamina is useless as well, but it gives 200 health. Or 150 and a minor running speed increase.

There's also Greater Vitality with a whooping 7 mp5.

Or Icewalker with 12 crit rating and 12 hit rating, if you don't mind having hit. ;)

Choose the useless thing you like, I'd say. ;)

Out of all these, I'd probably go with the running speed one, but that's because I like that small boost. Any of the 3 choices is still better than spirit which gives nothing at all. Not to the point where I'd smack a paladin over whatever they chose, though.

Most of the "Great rules to tweak your character" come from ElitistJerks, which means one thing: It only applies to a character at the theoretical maximum of the item curve in a raid context. They should put this sentence into their global banner or something..There are far too many idiots who will blindly follow anything written on EJ even if nobody at EJ ever thought about calculating it with that kind of character. One example where I personally always facepalm is when I see an Arcane Mage at Level 20 or something. Yes, Arcane rocks. No, you shouldn't try it before 80!Anyways, in your specific case there simply is no very good enchant. It just shows the danger of overly simplifying choices by tools like ElitistArmory.

Listening to these WoW stories is always great. It's like the world is filled with crazy people. It's WoW! Why does anyone have to min-max to that degree?! 99.9% of the game is going to be a complete joke if the only problem Tobold has is a 'misplaced' enchantment, and Tobold doesn't even do the .1% where it could feasibly matter.

I remember in EQ, when everyone claimed that inspecting was a bad thing and I remember thinking they were whiny. Apparently they were right, just eight years early in their complaining.

Spirit on your boots, of all the possible enchants, is probably the most useless enchant for paladins. Because it gives you nothing. Stamina at least gives you more survivability. Icewalker (+crit) or Tuskar (+movement) is the way to go, even if you're not a raider. I use Tuskar on every toon unless I'm way under hitcap, then its icewalker.

Spirit on your boots, of all the possible enchants, is probably the most useless enchant for paladins. Because it gives you nothing.

Could somebody who is better at theorycrafting than me define "nothing" in that phrase? Do you really mean absolutely nothing? I was under the impression that spirit *always* gives mana and health regeneration, just not a lot.

Just say: I am ahead of my time.

Funnily enough that was exactly what I said: I was already ready for needing spirit in Cataclysm. :)

* A very small amount of mana regeneration if it has been more than 5 seconds since you cast your last spell.

* A very small amount of health regeneration if you are out of combat.

I cannot say for certain, but you may receive more mana regeneration from Icewalker's 12 crit rating (Illumination procs). Therefore I would recommend either Icewalker or Tuskarr's Vitality, depending on whether you'd prefer a slight increase to throughput and mana regen, or a slight increase to survivability and move speed.

The priblem for paladins is that they(and shamans) have no "meditation" talent or anything else of that type so Spirit will only give you regen outside the 5 sec rule so in combat you will most of the time gain 0 regen from the Spirit. Most of the times Icewalker would give you more regen from Illumination then the spirit.

Neil and Daniel said it well. Spirit will help you regen mana when you run from fight to fight, but is not likely to help during a fight itself, due to how the "Five Second Rule" suspends spirit-based regen.

Spirit is useless to paladins because it only applies to regen outside the 5-second rule. That means that you have to stop casting for 5s before the Spirit regen even starts to kick in. As you know, paladins tend to spam heals, so stopping for 5+ seconds is extremely unlikely.

Druids and Priests have Meditation talents that give some Spirit regen all the time. In contrast, the Paladin "regen" mechanic is Illumination, which makes crit heals cheaper, and Divine Plea, which gives you back 25% of your mana pool.

So that's why Paladins focus on Intellect. It gives you a bigger mana pool in general, a larger amount of regen from Divine Plea, extra crit for Illumination, and extra spellpower (through one of the talents).

For boots, go for Tuskarr's Vitality, unless you have Pursuit of Justice. Extra run speed is huge, as the less time you spend running, the more time you spend healing. If you have Pursuit of Justice, put Icewalker on your boots. The extra crit benefits Illumination regen, and even the extra hit contributes to your Judgements landing.

In todays WoW raiding scenario you have to dance/move around ALOT. The faster you can get into position to heal or dps the higher your chance of success. Getting out of the fire becomes 8% eaisier with the stam enchant on your boots.

Since pallies can't heal while moving it is crucial your pally move fast into safe position to heal.

Most 25 man learning hard mode raid, its mandatory for EVERYONE to have Tuskarr's.

Regardless, a holy paladin's boot enchant will almost always be Tuskarr's Vitality, the only other option being Icewalker (or Nitro Boosts if engineering is specced). Usually, 8% movement speed alone will trump any other enchantment, and Tuskarr's Vitaliy and Cat's Swiftness have stats to boot (put not intended).

Finally, I understand that this is not the main point of your post, but I'm not sure why you would ask for gear-related advice *here*. EJ, among other websites, are a much more reliable source.

I agree with others re: run speed enchant. Unless you're packing Pursuit of Justice, which iirc does not stack with Tuskarrs, then 8% movement speed is going to be far and away the largest benefit for a pve holy paladin. You'll be able to reposition faster, chase tanks who run away from you, get out of the fire, etc.

Even in heroics, Tuskarrs makes an impact. Fights like Loken, Krik & Ick, Garfrost, and Bronjam have significant movement requirements. Fights like Black Knight, Galdarah, and Falric have mechanics that can push you out of LoS/range from your tank. While heroics are often not difficult, the stars can still align such that an undergeared tank is left without heals for a period of time, leading to a wipe. Tuskarr's enchant is the best way to prevent those sorts of oddities from becoming a problem in the first place.

Kiseran said: "One example where I personally always facepalm is when I see an Arcane Mage at Level 20 or something. Yes, Arcane rocks. No, you shouldn't try it before 80!"

I think most lower level arcane mages are just doing it for RP reasons, or because they like purple spells.

There's no reason why they shouldn't, either. Even in the old days, let alone now, you could manage fine as arcane. Levelling might take you a little bit longer with arcane, but maxing levelling speed is by no means everyone's priority.

Boot enchant? Tuskarr's is better than every other option for everyone except Main Tanks (and engineers), unless you need the hit from icewalker.

I agree that +spirit is largely superfluous, and I'm curious why you aren't using the "+stamina" enchant you refer to.

I understand that the spirit provides a small but non-zero boost to mana regen, but holydins don't really run out of mana or need to drink thanks to divine plea between pulls/phases. So likely you aren't using the regen you have [i]now[/i], much less the extra from the boots.

More importantly, Tuskarr's increases movement speed, which means you get out of fire quicker, and thus get the next heal cast sooner. Tuskarr's is a DPS increase because of this, and it's a throughput increase for the same reason.

If Spirit is worthless to Paladins (or even if it's simply sub-optimal), the game shouldn't let you put Spirit enchants or gems on your gear. Period. When it comes to specializing your character, games should offer you a variety of good choices, not good choices and bear traps.

Back when Crit was King I used Icewalker. I suppose the +12 hit rating made my judgments and cleanses less likely to miss (really stunk when you missed a cleanse on Steelbreaker's fusion punch). When I switched to the bubble spec and lost Pursuit of Justice, I switched over to Tuskar's Vitality for the extra run speed.

It's been a while, but I seem to remember there being a boot enchant that increases your mana and hp regen. Maybe it was only lower level, but wouldn't that make a bit more sense than spirit for a paladin?

As a pally you are always healing, so you never get outside the 5 second rule, and therefore the regen from spirit never kicks in.

Current plans for Cataclysm are to make spirit the regen stat for paladins (instead of int and MP5), but you are a bit early!

Also, to answer the poster who asked why Tobold asked here. I would say the answer is obvious - he got the right solution, really quickly, repeated about a gazillion times! Much better than searching through EJ's monolithic single thread leetspeak.

People say, "As a pally you are always healing, so you never get outside the 5 second rule, and therefore the regen from spirit never kicks in." but this is only true IN RAIDING. In heroics, there's quite a bit of time spent running between packs, or before you cast an initial heal in combat, where you're OO5SR.

+spirit will get you less mana then +crit will (plus +crit will make some of your heals better), so +crit is strictly better then +spirit.

+stam might be useful if the tank can't hold mobs, or there is AOE damage.

Who doesn't love run speed?

So, yeah, +spirit is about the worst thing you can have.

Also, you are correct, one enchant vs. the other is very unlikely to make a difference in a heroic. If you die with less then 150 overkill AND a heal was going to land before more damage the stam would have saved the day. I doubt that happens. It is harder to argue that a little crit wouldn't save you once in a while, but it is once in a GREAT while...

So by all means "upgrade" to +crit or something, but it just isn't a big deal.

Apps like these often fall short of being very useful for anything other than a hint or head's up. In my case it flags two of my gear as wrong for my tank, never mind the fact that I'm capped in def/hit/exp and if I were to remove those items my current hit rating would drop by 103 points taking me below that 8.1% I have now.